Current batteries contain high surface area transition metal oxide active material such as vanadium oxide powders. These oxide powders are obtained, for example, by milling of vanadium oxide material. Current methods for the manufacture of powders involve mechanical grinding of vanadium oxide material prepared, for example, by rapid quench of molten material or by precipitation from an aqueous solution. As a result, the vanadium oxide is in the form of lumps or large particles. By standard milling techniques it is difficult to reduce the lumps to a size less than 100 micrometers (microns) and extremely difficult to achieve closer to 10 microns. Smaller vanadium oxide particle sizes are desirable because the larger the surface area, the higher is the current drawn from a battery while the current density on the surface of the vanadium oxide active material remains low which allows high utilization of the active material. A typical coarse V.sub.2 O.sub.5 powder of 95% purity available from Fisher Scientific Company, has a median particle size of about 110 microns and a surface area of about 5 meters.sup.2 /gram. Such a powder would need extensive milling.
Another problem posed by transition metal oxide active material is that it is necessary to add carbon to the composite cathode. The requirement for carbon and the amount thereof depends, to some extent, on the specific oxide. The electronic conductivity of vanadium oxides decreases substantially (2-4 orders of magnitude) during lithium insertion upon discharge of a battery. This increases the need for even greater amounts of added carbon. Methods which allow reduction of the carbon content are important in order to increase the specific energies of the battery.